Social Media

12 YouTube Easter Eggs Worth the Distraction

YouTube Easter Eggs

1. Geek Week

In honor of YouTube's first annual "Geek Week," a weeklong event dedicated to highlighting geek culture, the site unleashed a slew of Easter eggs. One of them? A trick that converts the page into a retro ASCII version. Just go into the search bar and type "/ geek week" and there it is, in all its old school glory.

2. Pow!

Geek Week upped the ante with this feature. On certain YouTube videos created for Geek Week (like this one), typing "&pow=1&nohtml5=1" at the end of the URL adds a little "pow" button to the video's features. Clicking it will comic book-ify the entire video.

6. Missile Control

If you love old school games, go to YouTube and, while watching a video, type the numbers "1980" anywhere on the page (not as a comment, or in the search bar -- literally just on the page), and the game Missile Control will pop up.

7. Snake

If your video is taking forever to load, you'll notice the buffering symbol in the middle, a constantly whirring circle. Lo and behold, that circle can turn into a game of Snake if you simply just press the left arrow on your keyboard.

8. Stats for Nerds

This isn't the most elaborate egg, but it's still a funny little wink at anyone who's looking. If you right-click on a video, you'll see the option to click on "Stats for Nerds." It's exactly what it sounds like: a rundown of statistics of the video you're watching, including dimensions, frames and volume percentage.

9. Wadsworth

Typing "&wadsworth=1" at the end of a video URL will make it skip the first 30% of a video. Why? It's an homage to the Wadsworth Constant, a meme that spun out of control when a Reddit user (with the username Wadsworth) said the first 30% of any video is not worth watching.

10. Do the Harlem Shake

If you search the phrase "do the Harlem shake," your results page will immediately start blaring the song "Harlem Shake" by Baauer and shake violently when the beat drops. It's a reference to the viral dance craze.

11. So Wow, Much Doge

12. More Videos

In the roundup video "YouTube Rewind: What Does 2013 Say?" there's a bevy of even more videos. Using the annotation box, users can watch the link and hover over the screen with their mouse. Black annotation boxes will show up, leading to other videos on the site. We've gathered all of the videos for you right here.

You can't find everything YouTube has to offer just by using the search bar.

The social video site has been known to hide Easter eggs (hidden messages, jokes or features) deep within in its site. Games, inside tech jokes and pop culture references to memes, Star Wars and Star Trek are all buried inside — but not if you know how to dig them up.

We've gathered a list of 12 awesome YouTube Easter eggs you should hunt for. May the force be with you.

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